“I wish you would appoint someone to go to the auction taking place on Mondays in Los Angeles and buy me five or six Indians.” – Charles Brinley, majordomo of Rancho Los Alamitos in a letter to owner Abel Stearns in 1852.

On Sunday, June 19, 2011, Rancho Los Alamitos Foundation will host a lecture, discussion, and book signing featuring foremost California Indian historian, Dr. George Harwood Phillips, renowned author of the acclaimed publication Vineyards and Vaqueros: Indian Labor and the Economic Expansion of Southern California, 1771-1877.

“… for about a century a few thousand Indians managed, launched and sustained an economic revolution that radically altered a truly vast area of Southern California. And without the wealth that the expansion produced, the region’s industrial development would have been delayed.” –George Harwood Phillips, Vineyards and Vaqueros

In his comprehensive new work, George Harwood Phillips for the first time brings together the early historical record to masterfully document the working contributions of Southern California native people and culture during turbulent times. He recounts how the Tongva of Povuu’ngna and other native people built and sustained the emerging economy and culture of greater Los Angeles for almost a century. No one knows if the 33 Indians working at Rancho Los Alamitos in 1836 lived in the ancestral village of Povuu’ngna, but by 1852 there remained 33 Indians still living and working at Alamitos, fourteen of them under the age of twelve.

The community is invited to join the gathering at Povuu’ngna, the home of Rancho Los Alamitos, as pre-eminent California Indian historian, George Harwood Phillips, and members of the Tongva community today, consider how the native people throughout Southern California built the early region and Rancho Los Alamitos.

The Dr. George Harwood Phillips, lecture, discussion, and book signing is Sunday, June 19, 2011, from 9:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. at Rancho Los Alamitos Historic Ranch and Gardens, 6400 Bixby Hill Road, Long Beach, 90815

Free parking is at CSULB Lot 11 on Palo Verde Ave., with continuous shuttle service to the Rancho. Shuttle buses are handicapped accessible.

Admission is free and reservations are required by Monday, June 13, 2011. Reservations may be made by calling the Rancho at (562) 431-3541 or via email at info@rancholosalamitos.org.
_______________________
A visit to the Rancho is a retreat from the bustle of the surrounding city. On Wednesday, July 6, after an unavoidable closure for construction, the Rancho will reopen for tours Wednesday through Sunday from 1-5 p.m. School tours and Children’s Native American Cultural Workshops are scheduled weekday mornings. Admission is free and free parking is available on site. Enter though Bixby Hill residential security gate at Anaheim and Palo Verde.

Rancho Los Alamitos is owned by the City of Long Beach and operated by Rancho Los Alamitos Foundation as a public/private cooperative venture under the auspices of the Department of Parks, Recreation and Marine. For information about the site, tours, or special events and programs, please go to www.rancholosalamitos.org.